


The Kings' Path

by TheDarkChocolateLord



Category: Keeper of the Lost Cities Series - Shannon Messenger
Genre: Angst, Blood and Injury, Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Everyone Needs A Hug, Gen, Hallucinations, Hurt without the comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, No beta we die like Kenric, Panic Attacks, Past Child Abuse, The Pyren Brothers AU, Transphobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-14 17:07:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28674204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDarkChocolateLord/pseuds/TheDarkChocolateLord
Summary: What hallucinations were the others experiencing as they walked down the Kings' Path in Legacy?
Relationships: Biana Vacker & Dex Dizznee, Wylie Endal & Tiergan
Comments: 18
Kudos: 17





	1. Wylie

Wylie Endal knows how to stay calm.

He's discovered coping mechanisms and strategies for dealing with loss and disaster and grief, just trying to get through the weeks after his dad's mind broke, talking it out with Tiergan after he lost his mom, recovering after he was kidnapped and tortured by the Neverseen. 

Ten steps into the darkness. Fifteen. Twenty. His fingertips go numb, even stiff, his ability rendered useless by the magsidian stones that suck light from the environment; to distract himself, he focuses on his happy memories. Going to Claws, Horns, Wings, and Things at age six and getting his pet cockatrice. Days with his dads, as a little kid and even now, himself and Tiergan and Prentice all safe for once. Tiergan's smile and reassurances when Wylie was appointed as a Regent. Baking mallowmelt with Linh and Tam, covering the kitchen in flour. The day Tiergan first called him 'son'.

He's lost in the memories when he first hears a shuffling noise from the shadows; he ignores it, but a moment later there's a rush of wind that pins him in place; he's trapped in the eye of the whirlwind, like when he was kidnapped, and a moment later white light flashes around him.

A force field.

He tries to create a rainbow orb, but his ability won't work, the force field won't go away, and even the slightest movement results in a shock of static. 

"It's the end," a cloaked figure growls, and Wylie recognizes Brant's voice, a scraping, maniacal whisper threatening to burn him again, hands flaring red. "It's the end and it's all because of you."

Brant rotates so Wylie can see him, and the sight makes Wylie want to cry and scream and vomit all at the same time. Tiergan's body is limp in Brant's arms, covered in gashes and bruises and burns, too weak to speak or move.

"Tiergan—" Wylie's voice evaporates in the frigid air, and he's unable to speak, unable to move, trapped under the glowing dome.

"You should have told us when you had the chance," Brant hisses, holding a dagger to Tiergan's throat. "Should have told us before we took away the last person who cares for you. Should have proved to us that you care."

Tiergan's limp body nods, and with it an icy transmission slices through Wylie's mind.

I thought you were better than this. I thought you would make the right choice. I thought you wanted to keep me safe. I thought wrong.

His tone is devoid of warmth, his words piercing shards of hail, a storm of hate and disgust. This couldn't be happening—Tiergan couldn't mean it—yet the mental voice was unmistakably his.

When Wylie was eight and his mom had just died and he didn't want to talk, Tiergan would transmit to him. Reassurances and words that made the fog of grief lighten just a little, a ray of sunshine on a cloudy day. 

It helped, even if it was just a little, and the contrast makes Wylie want to cry. 

"Alone," Brant hisses, digging his dagger a little deeper. "You'll always be alone."

"I didn't—" Wylie tries, yet his voice doesn't carry, the force field is too thick, and he can't move, can't speak, can only stare as Brant slashes his dagger down.

NO!

TIERGAN!

"THIS WAY!" a voice calls, and it's like a flash of sunshine during a thunderstorm; the force field evaporates, as do Brant and Tiergan, and Wylie races towards the sound. As he does, the heavy fog in his mind lifts; he knows that Brant's dead and both of his dads are safe and he's just in Loamnore.

He keeps replaying his happy memories, trying to keep the hallucinations at bay. Tiergan playing his Beatles records from the human world. Manifesting as a Flasher, staring in wonder at his first-ever orb of light. His mother filling his room with tiny stars and rainbows and glowing orbs to help him fall asleep.

Remember this, Wylie. You're my wonderful sun—here his mother would laugh at her pun, and he'd laugh because she was laughing—and I love you, and I'll always love you no matter what.


	2. Biana

Biana Vacker isn't afraid of the dark.

It's one of the things she's learned as a Vanisher, how to let the light flow through her body so she can slip by unseen, whether it's a bright day with a clear blue sky or a dim room without even a window. She's always been able to sense the light, ever since she manifested, always known that it was there and that she was in control.

Maybe it's not that she isn't afraid of the dark, it's that she's learned to look for the light. 

Which, now that she's on a path devoid of all light, doesn't help her at all.

_ Is it possible to vanish when there's no light around? _

No, because Vanishing requires letting light pass through her body—but yes, because she's basically invisible as is, and if there _ was  _ any light around she  _ could  _ let it pass through so she stayed invisible—but being in a room with no light doesn't make you a Vanisher, so maybe the answer was no.

Maybe she could stump her Vanishing mentor with this next class. 

She laughs at the thought, but the sensation of Stina's and Dex's hands in hers snap her back to reality; this isn't the time to get philosophical. She's here on a mission, with them and Wylie and Sophie and—

Who else was there?

Why was  _ she  _ there?

Why was she suddenly forgetting everything?

A sound echos down the passageway, like the tinkling of ice in a glass of water combined with an explosion.

_ Shattering glass _ , Biana realizes, and with it comes a voice, high and sharp and cold, a dagger with a blade forged from ice, a voice she knows all too well. 

"The weakest one. Here alone to think she can save us all. Pitiful. Fool."

"I'm not alone!" Biana tries, but she can't see anyone, can't  _ hear  _ anyone, can't even feel the hands in hers. 

Was she even holding hands? Or was that just her imagination all along?

"Sounds like everyone realized that the Vacker princess is no more than a pretty face. Then again…I can't even call you pretty anymore."

A second sound of shattering glass, and Biana's left arm throbs in pain. 

Shattering. Splintering like the fragile glass people claim that she is made of. Blood runs down the lines that her scars trace out on her skin, like a spiderweb of deep red ink.

Like she's just been shoved into glass and metal all over again, barely fourteen years old and trapped behind a mirror, losing the energy to even breathe as her blood soaks her shirt, her cloak, the floor.

"Embrace your legacy. You are a Vacker. It's time for you to take your rightful place in this world."

The voice isn't Vespera's. It's deeper. Quicker. Softer. Warmer, even, the words reaching out like the speaker wants to give her a hug.

Her oldest brother.

"Join us, Bi," Alvar tells her, and Biana is frozen in place by the use of her childhood nickname. "We can win this fight. Finish it off for good. Aren't you tired of fighting this endless war? Defending our family name even as it crumbles to bits?"

"Yes."

The voice that escapes her lips isn't hers, it will never be hers, yet Alvar smiles—smiles!—like the answer pleases him. 

"Aren't you tired of being the youngest Vacker, the daughter of Alden and Della, the sister of the Golden Boy, but never  _ you _ ? Don't you want a way out, a way to prove that they can't control you anymore?"

"I'm not—I won't—" Yet Biana's protests go unheard, her stammers overwhelmed by Alvar's fluid words, tiny rocks in a rapid stream.

"I embraced this path, Bi. I saw this world, this  _ family _ , for what it really is. I tore down our legacy of lies and am forming a new one of my own."

"I'm not like you—"

"Sibling of the Golden Boy. Child of Alden and Della. Vanisher. Vacker. Ruthless. Remorseless, even. Ready for this broken world to change. I'd say we are very much alike, sister. The question is, do you have what it takes to be your true self? Do you have what it takes to escape people who try to tell you what you can and cannot do, what is right and what is wrong?"

Alvar steps closer, reaching out a hand like he used to do to help her up in tackle bramble. 

Biana won't take his hand, she won't join him, yet she can't walk away. With his Neverseen cloak gone, his hair rumpled, a smile across his face that she hasn't seen in years, he looks just like her older brother, just like the person who read her books and taught her and Fitz how to play base quest and bramble, who would give her a hug when she was feeling down.

Why does she hate him, really? What was he doing? Why doesn't she remember?

"I love you," Alvar smiles. "And I need you to do this with me. For a better world. That's what you want, isn't it? That's what you're fighting for?"

She can't say yes or no. Can't even reply. Can't even think as her brothers' eyes meet hers.

A voice shouts something—she doesn't know who or what, yet it's not Vespera or Alvar, and it shatters her trance like a throwing star through a mirror.

_ I'm not like him, I care more than he does, he tortured people and I would never do that,  _ Biana reminds herself, and the statement gives her the strength to step away.

She doesn't look back, doesn't want to see Alvar's lingering hand as she hurries down the path. Her feet are faster, her mind is clearer, yet Alvar's last words are unmistakable: "I know that you care. But do you have anyone who cares for you?"

_ You're on the King's Path and it was just a hallucination,  _ Biana repeats to herself as she hurries down the halls.  _ You're on the King's Path and it was just a hallucination, and you've got your family and friends, and you're Biana Vacker and nothing Alvar says can make you become someone you're not. _

Her hand brushes against someone else's, and Biana tries talking, hoping that this time her voice will be her own. "Hey."

"Hey," Dex responds, his voice still shaky.

"Are you okay?"

"Sort of."

"Me, too." She brushes her hand against his, hoping that the reminder that the other is there will keep both of them from slipping any further into the darkness. "Together?"

Dex interlaces his smooth fingers with her scarred ones. "Together."

  
  



	3. Dex

Dex Dizznee hates being lonely.

He doesn't mind being alone; by himself with his gadgets or elixirs, safe in his lab-slash-workshop, can be fun. Comforting, even. 

Lonely is different, though. Lonely is when he's shoved to the side to work on the caches when what he  _ wants  _ to do is be with his friends as they search Atlantis. Lonely is when he ate lunch with his alchemy mentor all through Level One because he was nerdy and awkward and the son of a bad match and utterly friendless. Lonely is when he's in a room full of people but somehow they all have better friends than him and he's left with no one to talk to.

Logically, he shouldn't be feeling either lonely or alone on the King's Path: he's holding hands with Biana and Wylie, he knows that they're there and that Sophie, Grady, Stina, Bronte, and Nubiti are all there as well, that they're doing this  _ together, _ yet he can't see anyone, can't hear anyone, can barely feel Biana's and Wylie's hands in his. 

He tries to focus on his newest gadget, sketches and plans coming together in his mind, hoping that the logic will keep the hallucinations at bay. It works, but he can't help but notice that the air is changing, drier and colder and saltier. A wind whooshes by; it makes the hairs on his arm stand on edge.

He tightens his grip on Biana's hand—she isn't there! Neither is Wylie, and he can no longer hear the others' footsteps.

He's alone.

Someone screams— _ Sophie  _ screams—and he races toward the sound; nobody is there! The air isn't salty anymore either; it's damp and smells like rotten candy and—

A cloth is forced over his mouth, soaked in syrupy sedatives. He struggles and fights and kicks, but nobody notices him, nobody hears him, nobody even realizes what's happening! His body goes limp, and he can't remember why he's here—can't remember who he's here for—can't remember what's going on!

"Dexter Dizznee," a familiar voice snarls, and while the voice makes Dex shudder, he can't place the sound. "We meet again. Only this time, none of your friends will come for you."

_ Last time, they rescued me! _

"Oh, they'll rescue the Moonlark," the speaker continues. "The Golden Boy. Prentice's son. But did you really think anyone cared about  _ you _ ? You were just collateral damage—the spare. Always have been, always will be. And do you know about spares, Dizznee? Do you know how easily they can be swapped out and traded away?"

"I'm not—"

But Dex knows the clusters that form his friend group, a network of close relationships that almost always leaves him out: Sophie and Keefe, Fitz and Biana, Tam and Linh and Wylie and Marella, and he knows that he's none of their favorites, not the first person any of them would save.

Useless.

A spare.

"Do you know  _ why  _ they abandoned you? I don't suppose you do. I don't suppose you're ready to accept it."

Images flash across the walls.

Sophie, unconscious with the ability restrictor stuck on her head—unconscious, or  _ dead _ ? Fitz, body limp on the floor of Exile, bug venom racing through his veins, a purple-black spiderweb covering his dark tan skin. Linh, frozen as blue lightning emanating from a cube attacks her body, eyes wide in terror, Keefe, hurt and bleeding as a figure wearing a Sucker Punch pummels him, Biana, alone as cloaked figures close in on her, panic switch red hot, searing her skin as she frantically tries to remove it, Tam, Wylie, Marella—

"All your inventions. All made to do "good." All used to cause harm. And look at where you find yourself now." The figure—he doesn't know who it is, doesn't know who  _ he  _ is—closes in on him. "And do you know what happens to spares that malfunction, Dizznee? They're useless. Worthless. Replaced."

The figure has him in a choke hold now—he struggles and fights, the hand heats up and he can barely breathe, can barely move—

"THIS WAY!"

It's like two wires inside his brain connected and finally lit up his mind; Dex races towards the voice, away from the cloaked figure— _ Brant _ —away from the nightmare. 

_ Brant's dead, _ he reassures himself, glad that his memories are working again.  _ Brant's dead and your...your friends care. _

Is the last statement really true?

"Hey," a voice next to him whispers. 

"Hey."

"Are you okay?"

"Sort of," he admits, not wanting to go into more detail than that.

"Me, too," Biana agrees; her hand brushes against his. "Together?"

"Together." Dex grasps her hand to ground himself to reality for the last of this nightmare.

_ Biana cares _ , he reassures himself.  _ She cares, and so does your family, and Sophie, and Keefe, and….. _

By the time they reach the door, his hand still intertwined with Biana's, he feels slightly less lonely after all.

  
  



	4. Grady

Grady Ruewen dislikes emptiness.

The quiet of the house after Jolie died, days where Edaline didn't want to get out of bed. A lavender room, dusty and silent, door shut, bookmarks still inside books, stuffed animals still astray, jars of makeup still open. The third-floor-bedroom that's usually full of kids plotting the overthrow of the government (he's not really exaggerating that one), barren and blank when Sophie left to join the Black Swan. Nights where Edaline is on an overnight mission and the other side of the bed is as flat as his mood, no warmth for himself to curl up against, no one to tease about hogging all the blankets.

In other words, the King's Path—no noise, no sight, no smells, no touch—is one of his least favorite places on the planet.

He's built up tips and tricks over the years. Don't think about Edaline or Jolie or Sophie; the hallucinations will start early and show them in danger. Don't think about his ability, about his mission; he'lll start worrying and the hallucinations will begin. Think about Havenfield, about the dinosaurs, about all the crazy vegetables he's trying to force Verdi to eat; about something so mundane, so everyday, that it can't possibly turn into danger. 

Verdi, head thrown back in a roar, purple fruit smeared all over Grady's tunicc. Renovating the gnomes' tree houses one summer to add more solar panels. Grooming the new mammoth and getting covered in purple fur, right when his fellow Emissaries showed up for a meeting that he'd agreed to host and then completely forgotten about. He focuses on those memories, on the most mundane details he can recall—the color of the grass, whether it was sunny or cloudy or pouring rain, the people around him.

He smells something metallic— _ it's just the path, it has to be the path _ . He moves faster, trying to recall the day they got the verminion, when his hands start to feel warm and wet in parts, other areas flaky like dried paint. 

_ Blood. _

He suppresses a shriek and forces himself to keep moving, but the substance keeps dripping off of his hands, thick and sticky and warm, and he doesn't know whose it is or why it's there or why  _ he's  _ there. His head feels heavier and heavier, dizzier and dizzier, and when he runs a hand across his forehead— _ no. _

It's the ability restrictor.

"You deserve it," a voice in the distance says, one that Grady hasn't heard in years and years— _ Jolie. _ "You let yourself go. Let your power become your downfall."

Two Wanderlings appear, each bearing a stone with a single name: one with orange-red leaves and light bark, the other far too familiar; pale yellow, star-shaped leaves and brown seedpods. 

_ Edaline Kelia Ruewen. _

_ Sophie Elizabeth Foster. _

"You deserve it," Jolie's voice echoes, and a third Wanderling appears, sweeping golden leaves and turquoise flowers, centered between the two. "You deserve it, you deserve it after what you did to me, after what you did to them. How you couldn't protect me. Let your ability run wild and got the two of them killed."

Grady grips the hand in his more tightly, any reassurance that he isn't alone, but his hand is empty and cold, reaching out into nothingness.

Sophie is gone.

Sophie is gone, and Edaline with her. 

"Control," Jolie declares, and her voice reverberates through the halls, echoed by Sophie's and Edaline's and his mother and father. "Control, Grady Howell Ruewen. What led to your downfall. You will never be able to keep yourself in check. Never be able to protect. Never be able to—"

"Stop!" Grady tries, but his voice is an ant among dinosaurs, unheard, unnoticed, useless. He takes a step forward, and it crunches—like dead leaves.

_ Wanderling leaves. _

Red and golden and yellow, brown seedpods and turquoise blossoms—himself, in a black cloak with a white eye on the sleeve, charging his wife and daughter—himself, eyes mad,  _ mesmerizing Edaline, mesmerizing Sophie _ —"NO!"

"Yes," the voice tells him, Jolie and Sophie and Edaline and so many more. "This is you, this is you, this is your legacy."

He looks down to see a Neverseen armband on his bicep, the white eye gleaming like a beacon, and when he tries to yank it off it won't go away. Cloaked figures surround him, encouraging him, pressing him on, and Edaline and Sophie lie still on the ground, eyes too still, Sophie's hair astray and Edaline's expression terrified, dead from what he did to them. 

Dead  _ because  _ of him.

_ You can do this, _ the cloaked figures hiss.  _ You are one of us now. Always have been. Always will be. This is your true self—stop running from the power! Embrace it! _

Grady runs, from the dead leaves and dead bodies, from the whispers and murmurs, the horrors in front of his eyes, yet they orbit him like a merry-go-round of nightmares. He sees Edaline, a tiny figure in their enormous bed, alone and shaking from horrors of her own, Sophie's eyes wide in fear as he forces Brant to burn off his own hand, himself wearing a Neverseen cloak, leading a charge against his daughter—

"THIS WAY!" a voice shouts, and he runs faster but the hallucinations won't leave him, words and images flashing by so fast that he can't tell what's real and what's not: Sophie and Edaline, frozen and bleeding on the beach of Lumenaria; Verdi, dead from an ogre attack; Jolie in the flames, a small lavender figure swallowed by fierce arcs of orange and yellow and red—

"KEEP UP!" the same voice yells, and this time he recognizes it as Nubiti. It lessens the haze, the horrors fading to black, and when it feels like he can't run any longer, a glimmer of light sears his corneas.

Stina is leaning against the wall, Wylie looks calm but his fingers are trembling, Dex and Biana are nervously gripping hands, Bronte's face is flushed, and Sophie—she's  _ there,  _ safe and alive, and he wants to hug her as tightly as possible, but Nubiti is already unlocking the door.

He has to settle for a shaky smile, which she returns.

  
  



	5. Bronte

  
  
  


Bronte Pyren's nightmares are always changing.

Sixteen years old, safe with his moms, yet his biological parents won't leave his dreams. Twenty-seven years old, snatching whatever sleep he can before the next battle, helpless as his commander is slaughtered by ogres in real life, then over and over again in his mind as he tries to sleep. Four hundred and fifteen years old, the youngest Councillor yet, nervous as he takes his oaths, unprepared for the danger to come, the battles he fights, the choices that are erased from his mind. Five thousand and sixty-one years old, his friend and brother both dead in an inferno of Everblaze, his best friend barely keeping her sanity together. 

And the King's Path knows exactly which ones to prey on, exactly which memories will make him hurt the most, which hallucinations he will never be able to forget.

_ None of it is real, _ Bronte repeats, determined to not lose himself to the darkness.  _ You're going to keep yourself together this time, none of it is real. _

Footsteps resonate behind him, and he's sure that it's just another elf or dwarf. It's too dark to determine anything, anyway. Yet the footsteps keep getting louder; someone lays a hand in his and Bronte's head swivels to the side.

It's Fintan.

Not the Fintan he knows now, all pointy ears and angled frame and sharp words. Fintan as a child, wearing orange footie pajamas, soft blond hair just shoulder-length, ice-blue eyes too old for someone so small. 

"Bedtime story?" the figure asks. His  _ voice  _ is how it used to be—high-pitched, soft, childish,  _ innocent _ . 

The opposite of the Fintan he knows this day.

"I can't sleep." Fintan looks up at him, the way he  _ used  _ to, like Bronte was the only thing that mattered to him in the world. "Please, Bronte? They're fighting again and I can't sleep!"

Bronte wants to hug Fintan. Wants to tell him that everything will be okay. But he knows that it's not true, knows that he has some other goal even if he doesn't know what, knows that he has to go.

"Bronte!" Fintan calls as he turns away and races down the path.

He doesn't look back, unable to meet his brother's eyes. The air is hot and dry, even smoky, and the faster he moves the worse it gets, like his ribcage is shrinking as his lungs shove against it in a battle for breath. Red and orange and yellow flicker in his vision, snatches of phrases echoing around the room, from his childhood,  _ his birth parents. _

_ Unstable. Unreliable. Useless. _

_ She can't do anything right.  _

_ You need to do better. _

_ You're not worth it. _

Pressure builds inside his mind, and he can't tell whether it's old or new, like he's going to inflict—no,  _ stop! _ —but all of a sudden he's seventeen again, with his foster parents and he doesn't know why he's angry or what's going on, and Ramil,  _ his mom, _ is collapsed on the floor, curly hair astray, thrashing in pain as the red light hits her, and he can't stop it and—

"I'm disappointed in you, Bronte." The tone is soft, yet the words are severe, and Oralie's voice is unmistakable. He sees Sophie's crumpled form after he inflicted on her, Fintan's eyes wide in terror, just fourteen, the day they ran away, Kenric, laughing and joking at Fintan's healing, his death moments away, Terik, leg crushed as Elwin and Osmond frantically work to stabilize it, Emery, covered in blood on the beach of Lumenaria—

_ Focus!  _ he tells himself, but the darkness is thickening, he can't control his arms, his mouth, his  _ words. You're Bronte Pyren, you're an Inflictor, you are not letting this get to you! _

The nightmares shift and fade, leaving him with an absence of black, a void of nothing, and Bronte forces himself to keep moving forward. He's lost contact with the others—who are they? why can't he remember? why is he here?

He races down the path; he stumbles into the wall and suddenly there's a figure offering him a hand—

"Come." It's Fintan, in his late hundreds, ears rounded and ruby circlet sparkling. "Join me and we can rule the world, brother. Together."

Bronte barely manages to shakes his head, yet Fintan doesn't back down. "Didn't you always want to make the world a better place? Haven't you seen how useless the Council can be?" Fintan's circlet shatters, jewel and metal stuck in his ever-tangled hair, one piece of the shrapnel leaving a nasty cut. "What makes us so different, really? What makes you 'good' and me 'evil'? Don't you know that working together is the only way we'll end this war?" A fireball rises from Fintan's hand, a Neverseen cloak appears on his shoulders, his ears become pointed. "Join me!"

"No!"

"Have it your way," Fintan hisses, seeping back into the darkness. "Have it your way, but are you sure that everyone will stay safe, that those you care about won't die in this war?"

Bronte has no reply. 

"THIS WAY!" Nubiti yells, and Bronte's head clears the way it does after he inflicts, the knot of negative emotions purged from his body. He hurries down the path; he's  _ not  _ going to lose himself again.

Even though he stays conscious for the rest of the path, the voices he heard and the people he saw resonate in his dreams night after night after night. 

  
  



	6. Oralie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of you might be looking at this and wondering "Wait, why is Oralie here? She wasn't there in Legacy!"  
> You're correct, she wasn't. I thought that it was strange that she didn't go, because she's willing to go to Loamnore later on to protect Sophie in a much more dangerous scenario—however, that time they don't have to experience the Kings' Path in full. So it would make sense if Oralie's experience on the Kings' Path last time almost screwed up her mission and she doesn't want to risk that happening again.....don't say I didn't warn you about the angst.

Oralie Lachuan has never fight into the elven binary of light and dark.

Darkness recalls shadows, cloaked figures with swords, nightmares that won't stop. Light evokes the flames that killed Kenric, the glowing ruins of Lumenaria, Mr. Forkle's dying breaths. Even her moral code is an undeniable shade of gray, a haze of broken oaths and disastrous choices. 

She's in Loamnore to get permission from King Enki to interview the dwarves who work at Exile about Prentice, and she keeps the goal in her mind as she starts down the King's Path: she's alone, she  _ has  _ to stay focused today.

She's maybe ten minutes in when a jagged sensation slams into her fingertips, like she's running her hand through coarse sand. It doesn't hurt, but the swirl of anger that accompanies it as always is enough to set Oralie on edge. The only emotions she can read without contact are human and sometimes elvin, and there are no other elves or humans around—are there?

More and more emotions attack her—tension, brittle and grainy, sadness, sticky and damp, suspicion, creeping and cold and slippery, the weak, watery feel of exhaustion, the scratchy, malleable texture of regret—Oralie can't tell where they're coming from, can't tell what's going on, doesn't even know if her hands are  _ hers _ , can't turn her ability off, and the textures are overwhelming, the emotions even more so, sending her into a spiral of despair and hurt, and she's  _ sure  _ there's nobody else on the path with her,  _ where are the emotions coming from? _

"I know the truth." 

Sophie's tone is as sharp and cold as Gethen's sword, gleaming with anger and betrayal; the emotional overload doubles now that Oralie recognizes the source. "I should have known it was you. Should have known you were too much of a coward to protect Prentice, that your kindness was fake, that no person is that nice without wanting something. And you  _ always  _ want something. You always want it all. You couldn't even protect your own daughter!"

Bronte's voice joins Sophie's. "Always lying. Always deflecting. All the lies you've told, the roles you've played. And look at where it got you. There's no one in the Lost Cities who trusts you, nobody who you can rely on. Did Kenric ever tell you everything? Do you think we fully trust you? Mr. Forkle?  _ Anyone _ ?"

She's frozen in place, her brain coming up with dozens of words but unable to speak a single one. 

"That's what I thought," Bronte snarls. "Don't you see what you've done?"

Kenric, disappearing into the neon yellow glow of the Everblaze.

_ I'm doing this for Sophie, Ora, I never loved you.  _

Mr. Forkle, collapsed in Lumenaria, blood pouring from the wound in his gut.

_ You could have warned me. You should have known. _

Sophie, the ability restrictor latched to her head, Gethen's sword embedded in her chest, dead in a pool of blood.

_ You didn't do enough. You'll never be enough. _

Bronte, his ancient presence tiny and peaceful in death, face too calm, body too still. 

_ I trusted you. I thought you were my friend. And look at where that got me. _

More and more images appear, more people dead or injured or turning their backs on her, more and more words that Oralie will never forget. They're all dead, they're all dead because of  _ her _ , and she's hopeless, helpless, she doesn't know what she did wrong and she doesn't know how to make things right and it's  _ her fault  _ and she should have seen this sooner and she can't breathe, can't think, can't keep going much further–

Shaking, scared, stumbling, Oralie collapses on the ground, unable to move, each breath as sharp and rough as shattered glass, and the voices keep echoing around her— _ worthless, liar, despicable, I hate you, anyone who knows the real you won't like you at all,— _

She doesn't know how long she's collapsed on the floor for, it seems like an eternity, she can't stop shaking and trembling, can't keep herself from crying much longer, can't keep herself from getting hurt much longer, maybe she  _ should  _ hurt herself maybe the pain would stop this, and she can't  _ think _ , can't  _ breathe _ , can't even sense the area around her, and she can't do this and the voices keep getting louder— _ I trusted you and look at where that got me, you're not the nice person you pretend to be, you're hopeless, you never were my friend, you're not a girl— _

"Councillor!" She can barely hear Krikor's voice, trapped as she is inside her own mind. can't tell whether the sharpness is anger or worry or both. "I'm sorry, but we need to keep going, King Enki won't wait for long."

Oralie nods, then realizes he can't see her, but speaking is too much effort as she struggles to stand without collapsing. She can't,  _ won't  _ let herself cry, yet the area around her eyes is damp, the feeling of holding back tears that she knows all too well. 

She runs her fingers across her embroidered sleeve, the texture reminiscent of the one that comes with caring. The motion reassures her, and it's enough to get her moving again, step by step, still shaking, but moving, at least. The hallway stays dark, but the air gets hotter and hotter, drier and drier, a hissing sound and then—

Flickers of neon yellow appear, and it's the Everblaze all over again and she can't find Kenric or Sophie or Bronte or anyone and—

It's light.

Flickers of light from around the edges of a barely-visible door.

Three more steps and Oralie's out of the darkness entirely; her mind clears, free of the shadows at last. She's here to get permission to interview the dwarven guards. 

She  _ needs  _ this to be worth it.


End file.
